Ten Years and Counting

Tue, May 7th, 2019

The push to bring more women directors into US boardrooms is front and center. There are more women appointed to board seats than ever, yet the overall percentage of female directors is barely changing. The reason is simple; directors, most of whom are older white men, do not step off of boards for, on average, 10 years, and about 25% hang around for 15 years or more.

The ground-swell among investors to bring more diversity into the boardroom has yet to produce term or director age limits that would facilitate the rotation of directors enabling the introduction of females and other diverse candidates.

There are all sorts of excuses trumpeted by corporate boards as to why tenure limits are not good, but the bottom line is that companies should be held accountable, and unless companies address the issue head-on, more states will follow California where the addition of women on public board is mandated by law.